The Bay of Plenty Indian Sports Club men's hockey team were victorious in their annual New Zealand Indian national tournament held over Queen’s Birthday weekend in Pakuranga, Auckland.

The team contested the men's B division of the tournament with five other teams. Pool play was contested over Saturday/Sunday and crossovers and finals on the Monday.

Going into tournament, the team was seeded fourth on the previous year’s result.

The first game of the tournament saw BOP take on North Harbour; this was one-way traffic as 11 goals were slotted and a clean score sheet maintained.

The second pool game was against Wellington, where numerous opportunities were squandered and BOP paying for their lack of finishing, going down 1-2.

With that result, BOP met top seed from the other pool in their semi, Auckland in front of their home crowd. As always, BOP and Auckland encounters are a passionate affair.

BOP found themselves 0-1 down early into the game, but showed character to come away with a final score of 3-1, the turning point was when a stroke was awarded at 1-1, which BOP converted.

This resulted in BOP meeting Wellington once again. The final was a different affair from the previous day with BOP able to convert their chances and win 4-1 over Wellington and therefore take the B division title.

The last time BOP held the title was in 1994, so a 17-year wait to claim their next title.

Five players made the tournament team – Jujhar Singh, Niwair Singh, Vinesh Sima, Nitin Ahuja and Ameet Barghav.

Next year, the team win promotion to the A division of the tournament, which will be held on home soil, in Rotorua, as Christchurch is unable to host the tournament.